Therefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned:
All Commentaries on Romans 5:12 Go To Romans 5
Thomas Aquinas
AD 1274
After indicating the benefits we obtained through Christ’s grace [n. 381], the Apostle now indicates the evils from which we were set free. And concerning this he does three things. First, he shows that through Christ’s grace we have been freed from the slavery of sin; secondly, from the slavery of the Law, in chapter 7, there [n. 518] Or do you not know, brothers; thirdly, from condemnation, in chapter 8, there [n. 595] at There is therefore now no condemnation. In regard to the first he does two things: first, he shows that by Christ’s grace we are set free from original sin; secondly, that we are shielded against future sins, there [c. 6; n. 468] at What therefore shall we say. In regard to the first be does two things: first, he deals with the history of sin; 208 secondly, of grace destroying sin, there [v. 15; n. 430] at But the gift is not like the trespass. In regard to the first he does two things: first, he sets forth the origin of sin; second, he manifests it, there [v. 13; n. 421] at Sin was indeed in the world. Concerning the first, he does two things: first, he sets forth the origin of sin; secondly, its universality, there [v. 12b; n. 417] at And so death passed. In regard the first he does two things: first, he shows the origin of sin; secondly, the origin of death, there [v. 12b; n. 416] at And through sin death. 407. First, therefore, he says that we have been reconciled through Christ. For reconciliation came into the world from Christ, as sin came into the world through one man, namely, Adam: "As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive" (1 Cor 15:22). Here it should be noted that the Pelagian heretics, who denied the existence of original sin in infants, claim that these words of the Apostle must be understood of actual sin which, according to them, entered this world through Adam, inasmuch as all sinners imitate Adam: "But like Adam they transgressed the covenant" (Hos 6:7). But, as Augustine says against them, if the Apostle were speaking of the entrance of actual sin, he would not have said that sin entered this world through a man but rather through the devil, whom sinners imitate: "Through the devil’s envy death entered the world" (Wis 2:24). 209 Therefore, the interpretation is that sin entered this world through Adam not only by imitation but also by propagation, i.e., by a vitiated origin of the flesh in accordance with Eph (2:3): "We were by nature children of wrath" and Ps 51 (v.5): "Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity." 408. But it seems impossible that sin be passed from one person to another through carnal origin. For sin exists in the rational soul, which is not passed on by carnal origin, not only because the intellect is not the act of any body and so cannot be caused by the power of bodily seed, as the Philosopher says in Generation of Animals, but also because the rational soul, being a subsistent reality (inasmuch as it can perform certain acts without using the body and is not destroyed when the body is destroyed), is not produced in virtue of the body’s being produced (unlike other forms which cannot subsist of themselves), but is caused by God. Therefore, it seems to follow that sin, too, which is an accident of the soul, cannot be passed on by carnal origin. The reasonable answer seems to be that although the soul is not in the seed, nevertheless there is in it a power disposing the body to receive the soul which, when it is infused into the body, is also adapted to it in its own way for the reason that everything received by something exists in it according to a mode of the recipient. That is why children resemble parents not only in bodily defects, as a leper begets a leprous child and a person with gout a gouty child, but also in defects of the soul, as an irascible parent begets irascible children and mad parents mad offspring. For although the foot subject to gout or the soul subject to anger and madness are not in the seed, nevertheless in the seed is a power which forms the bodily members and disposes them for the soul. 210 409. Yet a difficulty remains, because defects traced to a vitiated source do not involve guilt. For they are not deserving of punishment but rather of pity, as the Philosopher says of one born blind or in any other way defective. The reason is that it is the character of guilt that it be voluntary and in the power of the one to whom the guilt is imputed. Consequently, if any defect in us arose through origin from the first parent, it does not seem to carry with it the nature of guilt but of punishment. Therefore, it must be admitted that as actual sin is a person’s sin, because it is committed through the will of the person sinning, so original sin is the sin of the nature committed through the will of the source of human nature. 410. For it must be remembered that just as the various members of the body are the parts of one human person, so all men are parts and, as it were, members of human nature. Hence Porphyry says that by sharing in the same species many men are one man. Furthermore, the act of sin performed by a member, say the hand or the foot, does not carry the notion of guilt from the hand’s or foot’s will but from the whole person’s will, from which as from a source the movement of sin is passed to the several members. Similarly, from the will of Adam, who was the source of human nature, the total disorder of that nature carries the notion of guilt in all who obtain that nature precisely as susceptible to guilt. And just as an actual sin, which is a sin of the person, is drawn to the several members by an act of the person, so original sin is drawn to each man by an act of the nature, namely, generation. Accordingly, just as human nature is obtained through generation, so, too, by generation is passed on the defect it acquired from the sin of the first parent. 211 This defect is a lack of original justice divinely conferred on the first parent not only in his role as a definite person but also as the source of human nature -- a justice that was to be passed along with human nature to his descendants. Consequently, the loss of this original justice through sin was passed on to his descendants. It is this loss that has the aspect of guilt in his descendants for the reason given. That is why it is said that in the progression of original sin a person infected the nature, namely, Adam sinning vitiated human nature; but later in others the vitiated nature affects the person in the sense that to the offspring is imputed as guilt this vitiated state of nature on account of the first parent’s will, as explained above. 411. From this it is clear that although the first sin of the first parent is passed on to the descendants by generation, nevertheless his other sins, or even those of other men, are not passed on to their children, because it was only through the first sin that the good of nature, originally intended to be passed on by generation, was lost. Through all later sins the good of personal grace is lost, which does not pass on to one’s descendants. This also explains why, although Adam’s sin was removed by his repentance: "She delivered him from his transgression" (Wis 10:2), nevertheless his repentance could not remove the sin of descendants, because his repentance was performed by a personal act, which did not extend beyond him personally. 412. Consequently, there is but one sole original sin, because the defect following upon the first sin is the only one passed on to the descendants. Therefore, the Apostle is careful to say that through one man sin came into the world, and not "sins," which he would have said, if he were speaking of actual sin. 212 But sometimes it is said in the plural: "And in sins did my mother conceive me" (Ps 51:7) because it contains many sins virtually, insofar as the corruption of bodily desire [fomes] inclines one to many sins. 413. It seems, however, that original sin entered this world not through one man, namely, Adam, but through one woman, namely, Eve, who was the first to sin "From a woman sin had its beginning and because of her we all die" (Si 25:24). This is answered in a gloss in two ways: in one way, because the custom of Scripture is to present genealogies not through the woman but through the men. Hence, the Apostle in giving, as it were, the genealogy of sin makes no mention of the woman but only of the man. In another way, because the woman was taken from the man; consequently, what is true of the woman is attributed to the man. But this can be explained in another and better way, namely, that since original sin is passed on along with the nature, as has been said, then just as the nature is passed on by the active power of the man, while the woman furnishes the matter, so too original sin. Hence, if Adam had not sinned, but Eve only, sin would not have been passed on to their descendants. For Christ did not contract original sin, because he took his flesh from the woman alone without male seed. 415. Augustine uses these words from the apostle Paul to respond to the heretic Julian, who asked: "The who is born does not sin, the who begot him does not sin, the one who bore him does not sin; through what crack, therefore, in such a garrison of innocence do you suppose sin has entered?" But Augustine responds: "Why do you seek 213 22 Augustine, De Nuptiis et Conc., book 2, ch 28. a crack when you have a wide open gate? For according to the Apostle, sin entered into this world through one man."22 416. Then he touches on the entry of death into this world when he says, and death through sin entered this world: "Ungodliness purchases death" (Wis 1:12). However, it seems that death does not arise from sin but from nature, being due to the presence of matter. For the human body is composed of contrary elements and, therefore, is corruptible of its very nature. The answer is that human nature can be considered in two ways: in one way according to its structural principles, and then death is natural. Hence Seneca says that death is natural not penal for man. In another way man’s nature can be considered in the light of what divine providence had supplied it through original justice. This justice was a state in which man’s mind was under God, the lower powers of the soul under the mind, the body under the soul, and all external things under man, with the result that as long as man’s mind remained under God, the lower powers would remain subject to reason, and the body to the soul by receiving life from it without interruption, and external things to man in the sense that all things would serve man, who would never experience any harm from them. Divine providence planned this for man on account of the worth of the rational soul, which, being incorruptible, deserved an incorruptible body. But because the body, which is composed of contrary elements, served as an instrument for the senses, and such a body could not in virtue of its nature be incorruptible, the divine power furnished which was lacking to human nature by giving the soul the power to maintain the body 214 incorruptible, just as a worker in metal might give the iron, from which he makes a sword, the power never to become rusty. Thus, therefore, after man’s mind was turned from God through sin, he lost the strength to control the lower powers as well as the body and external things. Consequently, he became subject to death from intrinsic sources and to violence from external sources. 417. Then when he says and so death passed (v. 12c) he shows the universality of this process in regard both to death and to sin, but in reverse order. For above he treated first of the entry of sin, which is the cause of death’s entry; but now he deals first with the universality of death as with something more obvious. Hence he says, and so death or the sin of the first parent, spread to all, because men merit the necessity of dying on account of a vitiated origin: "We must all die" (2 Sam 14:14); "What man can live and never see death?" (Ps 89:48). 418. Then he touches on the universality of sin when he says, because [in whom] all men sinned. According to Augustine this can be understood in two ways: in one way, in whom, i.e., in the first man, or in which, namely, in that sin; because while he was sinning, all sinned in a sense, inasmuch as all men were in him as in their first origin. 419. But since Christ derived his origin from Adam (Lk 3:23 ff), it seems that even he sinned in Adam’s sin. Augustine’s answer in On Genesis is that Christ was not in Adam as completely as we were, for we were in him according to bodily substance and according to seed. But Christ was in him in the first way only. 215 Some who interpreted these words incorrectly supposed that the entire substance of all human bodies, which is required for a true human nature, was actually in Adam and that in virtue of a multiplication traced to God’s power, something taken from Adam was increased to form such a quantity of bodies. But this is far-fetched, because it explains the works of nature by a miracle. Indeed, it is obvious that the human body, even though it is required for the integrity of human nature, corrupts and becomes a corpse. Hence it is better to say that, because everything generable is corruptible and vice versa, the matter which was present under some form other than human before a man is begotten, received the form proper to human flesh. Accordingly, not everything in our bodies that belongs to the integrity of human nature was in Adam actually, but only according to origin in the way that an effect is present in its active principle. According to this, therefore, there are in human generation the bodily material, which the woman proffers, and an active force, which is in the male’s seed; both are derived originally from Adam as their first principle. Hence, they are said to have been in him according to seed and according to bodily substance, inasmuch as both came forth from him. But in Christ’s generation there was the bodily substance which he obtained from the virgin; in place of the male seed was the Holy Spirit’s active power, which is not derived from Adam. Consequently, Christ was not in Adam according to his seedly power, but only according to bodily substance. Thus, therefore, we not only receive sin from Adam and contract it; we also derive human nature from him as from an active principle -- which amounts to being in him according to seedly power. But this is not true of Christ, as has been stated. 216 420. Finally, it seems that original sin does not pass on to all, because the baptized are cleansed of original sin. Hence, it seems that they cannot transmit to their descendents something they do not have. The answer is that through baptism a man is freed from original sin as far as the mind is concerned, but the infection of sin remains as far as the flesh is concerned. Hence the Apostle says below (7:22): "I serve the law of God with my mind, but the law of sin with my flesh." But man does not beget children with the mind but with the flesh; consequently, he does not transmit the new life of Christ but the old life of Adam.
